


Only For Her

by EmilieVitnux



Category: Eragon (2006), Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Anyelle, F/M, Rumbelle Secret Santa, Rumbelle Secret Santa 2016
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-22
Updated: 2016-12-21
Packaged: 2018-09-11 00:59:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8946853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmilieVitnux/pseuds/EmilieVitnux
Summary: Prompt : Durzelle : Only For her.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ofheroismandsacrifice](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=ofheroismandsacrifice).



> Wrote for the RSS 2016, for the lovely ofheroismandsacrifice. If you love great RPG, please check her Tumblr. Sorry to post with a little late, I was sick earlier. Here is the first chapter of my gift for this RSS. Hope you'll like it! :)
> 
> And I would also thank my friend HistoireEternelle, for beta-reading this, but also to help me with all the "Eragon-part" of this fiction. She's a pro, she's the best, she barely cried while beta-reading this fiction.

She couldn’t do anything except watch. Watch the Ra’zacs destroy the forest and the farms around her village. Why? Why did the Ra’zacs chose to attack them? Her village wasn’t big, wasn’t important. They were just farmers wanting to live their life alone and away from the war. Not a threat to anyone. And yet, war and death found them. They couldn’t fight or run away, the Ra’zacs would find them and kill them, or worse. The men tried to fight, they tried to build a wall around the village, but Belle knew it was useless. The wall wouldn’t stop the Ra’zacs forever; they had won a day, maybe two, but certainly not three. 

“Please Gods, have mercy and make them kill us quickly, don’t let us suffer,” Belle cried hopelessly. “Let us leave this earth with dignity.”  
“Well, well, well, why the pessimism?” a voice said behind her, startling her. She turned around and found the reason of her despair: Galbatorix, the king. The sorcerer. The one behind the Ra’zacs’ attack. It was common knowledge that the Ra’zacs were controlled by him.   
“King Galbatorix,” Belle acknowledged with a slight bow. “What are you doing here? Do you want to finally free this earth and die among us?” Belle spat.   
“Ooooh my knights warned be about your temperament, but they didn’t do you justice. Is it a way to speak to your king?”   
“What are you gonna do? Kill me? I’ll be dead soon anyway,” Belle sneered. She wouldn’t die being his slave.   
“You know…,”Galbatorix murmured, “I could save you and your village if I wanted to. It would be really easy for me.”  
“Save us,” Belle suddenly almost begged, sickened by the need in her voice. It was going against everything she believed in but she had to do something to save her village and if crawling at the feet of that mongrel was the price, she was willing to pay it. “We’ll do anything. But save our village.”  
“Anything?” Galbatorix purred in a wicked smile. “Whatever I want, you’ll do it?”   
“Anything,” Belle said, starring him right in the eyes. He wasn’t the first man who looked at her this way. Lust in their eyes, wanting only one thing from her.   
“Then we have a deal!” gloated the sorcerer. “I know exactly what I’ll use you for.”

_____________________________

It’s been three months since she made her deal with Galbatorix. Like he promised, he saved her village. Soon after she accepted his deal, the Ra’zacs left her village. And now she had to fulfill her part of the deal or they would return and finish what they started. She hadn’t told anyone what she had done, what she was supposed to do for Galbatorix. She knew that he father would try and stop her, telling her that there were other ways. But Belle knew better. They didn’t have a choice. So that night, while everyone was celebrating the victory, she had left silently, without saying goodbye to anyone. 

She had to find someone, a man, a Shade; she didn’t even know what he really was. She didn’t even know where to find him. Just that he was named Durza and that she had to kill him. 

After a whole day searching and looking for this Durza – she didn’t even know what he looked like – Belle decided to stop in a tavern for a while. She needed to drink something cold; she needed a place to sleep. She needed to stop and think. 

Belle entered the tavern and sat in a booth in the corner, in the shadow, away from everyone. She didn’t have the time or energy to deal with the questions people would ask. From where she was, she could see and hear the whole room. A man was sitting in another corner, his face hidden in the shadows of his hood, talking to no one, he wasn’t eating either, he was just sitting there, probably scanning the room like she was. The rest of the people in the tavern were mostly traveler trying to find a place to stay for the night or knights wanting to tell their tales to anyone ready to buy them a drink. Men talking… nothing interesting for her.

She decided to use her time waiting for a waitress reading her new book. Sadly nothing about a prince in disguise or adventure, only information about dark magic. When she struck her deal with Galbatorix, he gave her a year to find, win the trust and kill a man named Durza. Well not a man… A Shade. Whatever that was. 

Belle knew a lot of things; she was smart according to a lot a people around her. And she tended to agree most of the time. She had read a lot of books about a lot of things, so it was rare that she heard someone talking about something she didn’t know. And yet… She had absolutely no clue about what a Shade could be. She had tried to find information in her books at home, but there was nothing. Given that this Durza was a former servant of the king who apparently succeeded in surpassing him, she could guess that a Shade was made of dark magic. She didn’t know anything about him, she wasn’t even sure if him being a Shade meant that he wasn’t human anymore… Probably not. Belle was so eager to strike this deal and save her family that she didn’t even stop to think about why Galbatorix couldn’t kill this Durza himself, after all, he was powerful and unstoppable, why would he need the help of a peasant like her to kill this… thing? 

“It’s a fearsome beast! Ravaging a faraway village! Its eyes burn with fire. No men have ever been able to kill it. But we will!” a man said in the middle of the room. He was standing next to a ridiculous poster of some man, badly drew. Apparently the man was trying to recruit people for a suicide mission. Belle rolled her eyes. Men. Always trying to find something to kill. Probably no one tried to understand why this beast acted the way it did. Why it was so dangerous. No, they just had to kill it.   
“What is this beast?” some uninteresting fool asked.  
“It’s not a beast, it’s a monster. It’s a Shade. It walks and talks like a man, but make no mistake; it’s a monster, a demon capable of killing you without hesitation,” the first man explained. This brought Belle’s attention back to what he was saying. A Shade?   
“And what’s its name?” someone else asked.   
“His name is not important. What’s important is that we can kill him. Even this beast can’t defeat a group of strong and brave men! Especially when I know how to kill the ones of its species,” the man gloated.   
“And how would you kill something that no one before was able to kill?” one of the waitresses asked. This won a few laughs from the rest of the audience. Everyone was listening now. Even Belle who abandoned her book, maybe these men could help her in her difficult task.  
“Simply. No one before had this,” the man said, showing a dagger. The dagger was made of gold and weirdly shaped. As if someone tried to cut some parts out. “This dagger is magic; it’s the only thing capable of killing a Shade,” the man explained. “All we have to do is to get close enough to stab it and then… We’ll be heroes for the rest of our days…” the man finished with a wicked smile on his face. 

Everyone started to cheer and talk excitedly, as if showing a big weird knife was a proof that they’ll soon all be rich and famous. 

“Oh really?” a cold voice rose from the other side of the room. 

The silence fell on the whole room. It was as if every men and women in the room realized that this voice wasn’t human. It belonged to the man in the other corner, the one under the hood. 

“You really think that this … toy can kill a Shade?” the man under the hood asked with the same cold voice.   
“Yes stranger. I told you, the Shade can easily be killed with the right weapon,” the man repeated. But Belle and everyone could see that he didn’t seem really sure anymore. It was as if the man under the hood stole the entire warmth in the room.   
“Well… Why don’t you test it?” the stranger in the corner asked. He rose slowly from his chair, his face still invisible, and started to walk to the man with the dagger. His walk was strange, like he was more floating than walking.   
“Test it?” the first man laughed. “On what?” he tried to laugh again, but his laugh seemed forced, as if he was trying to convince himself that he has still the upper hand in this conversation.   
“Well… Test it on me!” the stranger said, pushing his hood back 

The whole room gasped when they saw what was hidden until then. Long crimson hair framing a deathly white face looking like a polished skull that had its skin pulled back to give the appearance of life. The man was not human; he was a monster. His dark brown eyes were the only remotely human feature Belle could see. And something emanated from him; it was like everyone could feel dark magic seeping from his body. Honestly the man wasn’t tall, quite the contrary, he was barely taller than Belle; actually nearly all the men in the room were taller than him. And yet he looked like a giant, as if the power he obviously seemed to have forced everyone to look up to him. Belle didn’t even have to ask for his name, she knew he was the one she was looking for: Durza. 

“You…” the man with the dagger stammered. He seemed terrified and way less sure of himself than he was a few moments before. Belle could see his hand shake while trying to hold his dagger tighter. “You’re the Shade”.   
“Well… My name is Durza. We don’t call the peoples by what they are but by their name right? Or should I call you Idiot?” the Shade said with a smirk. 

In other circumstances people would probably have laughed at his joke, but right now everyone seemed terrified and ready to run away from the tavern. The courageous men, the brave knights, all these men seemed to have disappeared to only leave children in their place. 

“I’ve come to this place because I’ve heard about you… About your pathetic idea that this,” he pointed at the dagger, “could kill me.”   
“You came because you know I could kill you?” the man with the dagger said. It was more a question than an affirmation; even he couldn’t believe it. It was ridiculous; it would be foolish for Durza to come here while knowing that this weapon could end him.   
“Oh noooo. I came here to prove that you are an idiot. But I’m feeling generous tonight and I’ll give you a chance. Stab me with it. Stab me so that everyone will know what happen to the fools who think they can kill me… How do you say? Easily kill me and become heroes for the rest of your days?” mocked Durza  
“You want me to kill you?” the man said dumbfounded.   
“Actually you don’t have a choice,” Durza replied. “Stab me with it, and hope for being right. Or don’t stab me and I’ll kill you. But either way, you won’t leave this room alive. So now do it. Stab me wherever you want, but do it quickly, ‘cause I’m losing patience.”

The man raised his dagger and stabbed him without hesitation. Durza gasped and took a few steps back, the dagger planted right in the middle of his chest. He tried to grab it while trying to take a breath. The man started to smile smugly. Already dreaming about what his victory would bring him. But something was wrong. There was no blood, and soon the gasp turned into a laugh. A cold and merciless laugh.

“Well… That was a bit of a letdown,” Durza mocked, taking of the dagger out and letting it fall at his feet. “As I said, this toy can’t kill me. No man can kill me,” the Shade added with a dangerous spark in his eyes. “But I wouldn’t say the same about you.”

And with that, he raised a hand in direction of the other man. Immediately red flames started to encircle the man, the fool tried to stop them, but it was impossible, soon the flames started to engulf him, to burn him alive. Belle could smell his flesh melt from across the room, the smell was horrible, and she had to fight against her need to vomit. Closing her eyes, she prayed for this man to have a quick death. He didn’t need to suffer for his foolishness. Soon the man disappeared in the flames, yelling, begging for mercy, but no one was able to save him. The man was dead the moment he said he could easily kill a Shade. 

“Does anyone else want to try?” Durza asked joyfully. 

But nobody answered, all the men so sure of themselves a few minutes before were now trying to disappear by looking straight at their drinks or their foods. As if they hadn’t just seen a man burn alive in front of them. 

“That what I thought,” Durza said smugly. “Now that it’s solved I want every one here to spread this tale. Tell the story of the man who though that a ridiculous butter knife could kill me. Tell everyone that nothing and no one in this land can kill me. And stop making me lose my time!” Durza purred, his soft voice reverberating dangerously in the silent room, before turning on his heels and leaving. 

He left by the door like a normal man. As if he didn’t have to prove anything to anyone. And he didn’t, no one in the tavern dared to speak or try to follow him. Well no one except Belle. She jumped on her feet immediately and followed him without hesitation. She would never have another chance. 

“Hey wait!” Belle called once she was outside, hoping to stop him from disappearing. But, he didn’t pay attention to her, and continued to walk. “Wait” Belle called once again. “Durza wait!” 

He finally stopped and turned around slowly to face her. 

“Who are you?” the Shade asked, his eyes gauging her.   
“Belle. I’m Belle of Avonlea.”  
“And what make you think that you can make me lose my time like that, Belle? I case you didn’t notice in the tavern, I don’t like losing my time,” Durza replied menacingly. “So you better have a good reason for calling me”.   
“I… I…” She had no idea what she could say. She actually didn’t think she would be able to find him and even less talk to him. Damn her and her habit to act by instinct without thinking.   
“I’m losing patience!” Durza warned.  
“I want to make a deal!” Belle said quickly. “I want to make a deal to save my village.”  
“A deal?” Durza repeated puzzled. “A deal for what?”  
“To save my village. We’ve been under the attack of the Ra’zacs for months now. We’ve been able to slow them down, but it won’t last forever. I want to make a deal, to ensure my village‘s safety for the years to come,” Belle explained. It was true, mostly. What do they said? The best lies have truth in them?   
“Well you’re talking to the wrong man, “mocked the Shade. “If you want to stop the Ra’zacs, you need to talk to their master, the king!” The way he say the word king seemed more like an insult than a mark of any respect what so ever.   
“I tried, but he doesn’t’ answer to our letters begging him for help. I’ve tried to see him in his castle, but it’s impossible” Belle said. “You’re our only hope.”

Durza looked at her, his eyes narrowed as if trying to see if she was lying to him or not. Would he be able to perceive her lies? She didn’t know if it was one of his powers. Maybe Shades could see when one was lying to them. 

“Let’s say that I agree to help you. What do I get?” Durza said after a while. He still seemed ready to kill her at the first opportunity, but at least he was ready to listen to her.  
“Everything you want” Belle replied. “We have gold, and jewelry. Our men work hard in the mines near our village we could give you…” But she couldn’t even finish her sentence; the sorcerer raised a hand impatiently.   
“I don’t care about gold and jewelry. If it’s all you have to offer, then I’m not interested,” Durza said curtly. “You can say goodbye to your village” he added turning his heels  
“Even if said village could help you kill Galbatorix?” 

That stopped him immediately. Once again, Durza turned around slowly to look at her. 

“What do you mean?” 

He didn’t yell, he didn’t threaten her and yet, she could feel in his voice that the situation had become more dangerous than a few seconds ago. Like the idea of killing someone turned him into a darkest soul than he already was. Honestly Belle didn’t know what she was saying, she just wanted to buy some time. So she did something she learnt from her father when he was playing cards with his friends: she bluffed. It was luck that unlike her father, she was actually capable of lying. 

“You say it yourself; Galbatorix is the one controlling the Ra’zacs, why would he send his pets against an useless village like mine if he didn’t need something from us?” Belle said slowly. 

It was far-fetched honestly, but the more she thought about it, the more the attack of the Ra’zacs seemed forced and useless. As if someone sent them for a good reason. 

“And what would that be?”  
“I have no idea, but it should really be important if he needs to send thousands of Ra’zacs just to destroy one village. We’re not warriors, not sorcerers. Killing us all would be really easy for him. And yet he decided to send his strongest pet monster to destroy our village,” Belle said convincingly. 

Durza once again looked at her with suspicion, clearly not believing what she was saying. And for good reason, she didn’t believe it herself. It was just a ridiculous idea for her to buy time. 

“Alright, now I’m listening,” the Shade finally said after a few moments. 

Belle did her best to hide her surprise that he actually decided to listen to her tale. The easiest part was done. 

_____________________________

It’s been three days since Durza accepted to listen to her and brought her to his … well she could call this his lair. There were no window, no clock, now way to know what time it was or if she had been here for three days or three weeks. He had left her alone her soon after he accepted her deal. The Shade had simply said that he wanted to check by himself what could be so interesting in her village and that he’d come back soon enough. Until then, she was trapped in here.

She wasn’t in need of anything. She had food, water, a bed and a bathroom. All she needed and far more than she had had for the past three months. At first she had thought about contacting Galbatorix to tell him that she had successfully approached Durza, but she changed her mind when she realized that it didn’t really mean she would succeed in her task. And the lair was probably magically protected, if she tried to contact the King, Durza would probably know it in the minute and she would lose her only chance to kill him. No, all she could do now was to wait for him to come back.

Wait and maybe explore a little.

The lair wasn’t really big, but she could still try to find something to do or discover until he finally came back. He had warned her that nothing in this place could hurt her and that she would not be able to leave until he decided that she could go. This lair was his, probably created with his magic. So there was nothing she could find here to kill him. But she could still find something about him, a weakness or at least a way to win his trust.

She had explored practically all the rooms, but she hadn’t found anything remotely interesting. Some rooms were empty, others full of many things. She had found a room full of blood and was trying to forget about it. She only had one room left to explore now. This room felt strange, when she passed in front of it, she could feel that something was different. There were so much magic around this room that she could actually feel it. Magic was like a perfume, one can wear a perfume and, if it was subtle, nobody would smell it, but if one were to use too much perfume, then everyone would smell it. Magic was the same, when there was too much magic in one place, everyone could feel it. It cracked in the air, some kind of vibration all around the place. When she touched the door handle, she could actually feel electricity running around her hand, around her whole body. As if the magic was checking who was trying to come in. She opened the door trying to get rid of this weird feeling.

The room was empty, except for a cabinet in the middle of the room. Intrigued, Belle approached it slowly. She could feel the magic around her, waiting, watching her. Ready to attack if she made one single mistake. So what was it? This room seemed more protected than any other room in this place, for what reason? She stopped in front of the cabinet, slightly shaking. The magic, this weird feeling was all around her, and there was something, she didn’t know what, a feeling pushing her to open the cabinet and look inside. But what would happen if she tried? Would she burst in flames like the man at the tavern?

Throwing prudence in the wind she opened the cabinet and closed her eyes, ready for the attack of the magic. She could feel the magic swirl around her, move, but not doing anything. She slowly opened her eyes to finally look inside and see what it was all about.

It was a rock. A big, grey rock. What the hell?

All this magic, all this protection, for a stupid rock? What was it? A magical rock from a magical place? Or just a way to laugh at the curious girl she was? She looked once again at the rock and studied it to try to find something proving that it was a special rock. Nope, still nothing, still a useless rock.

But the more she looked at it, the more she felt the need to… touch it. To take it in her hands and to never let go. What was it? She felt like this rock belonged to her, which was ridiculous, considering that she has ever seen this rock before. And why would she want a rock? 

But against her logic, she could feel her own hand rising to touch it; she brushed it with the tips of her fingers, slightly, delicately. As if it was a baby that needed to be carefully handled. While she was watching her fingers caress the rock, she forgot about the world, about Galbatorix, about Durza, about the deal, she just wanted this rock. 

Until it cracked in front of her. 

The rock started to crack exactly where her fingers had been. This broke the charm it seemed to have on her and she suddenly realized what she had done. Panicking, Belle put her hands flat against the stone, trying to put it back together, trying to erase the tiny fissures that spread on the surface. But the more she touched it the more damages she did.

“What have you done?” Durza’s yell startling her out of her mind. “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!” 

She turned around to face him, but he pushed her away from the rock. Spots of red appearing on his cheeks in his otherwise white face, he seemed ready to kill her right there and then. Belle was terrified, not knowing what he could do to her. Would he kill her? Would he keep her as his prisoner? She honestly hadn’t done anything to his rock. She simply touched it, it seemed like the rock had been calling her, like keeping this rock was what she was supposed to do. But it was ridiculous, why would she felt the need to touch a rock? And not even a pretty rock. Just a stupid and bland rock. 

“How did you do that?” Durza asked again.  
“Do what?” She was tired of being yelled at by powerful sorcerers. Why did they feel the need to yell and threaten?   
“How did you…,“ he looked at her and stopped to talk suddenly “You have no idea with you did, don’t you?”   
“No I don’t. I just touched this... Rock! And it started to crack. But I didn’t do anything else!” He could kill her if he wanted; she wasn’t going to beg him. She ended up in this situation because she begged someone to spare her life.  
“Leave! And don’t come back. Be happy that I choose to spare your life and never come back,” Durza spitted. His long finger closing on her elbow, he dragged her out of the room. Hauling her to what was supposed to be the front door of his lair, he pushed her out before disappearing, leaving her alone on the road. 

She had lost her only chance to kill him. All she could do now was to talk to Galbatorix and hope for his mercy. 

_____________________________

“Idiot!” Galbatorix yelled before slapping her. Belle fell to the ground, her cheek bruised. She had been expecting the slap; she had known that the king wouldn’t take her failure well. 

After being thrown out by Durza, she had tried to contact the king to tell him what happened and to try and make another deal. But one couldn’t summon the king like that; one had to go to king, not the other way around. He had let her wait for a week before finally accepting to see her. He had immediately realized that she had failed and before she had time to explain what happened he had started to yell. Even if her cheek hurt like hell, she wasn’t really surprised, the king wasn’t known for his goodness.

“It wasn’t my fault! He got angry when I touched his… His…” she couldn’t end her sentence. It was like something kept her from telling him about the rock. It was ridiculous, it was just a big and stupid rock, and yet, Belle could feel that she should keep this part of her story silent.   
“His what?” Galbatorix asked. “What did you touch?”  
“His dagger,” Belle lied. “I tried to steal his dagger from him and he started to yell at me.” She said the last with her most innocent and naïve face. Playing the role of the foolish beauty that thought she could stole from a powerful sorcerer that easily.   
“You tried to kill him with his own weapon?”  
“Well yeah… I heard that only his dagger could kill him,” Belle said. A blatant lie, she knew that, but that would explain why she tried to steal from Durza instead of killing him. 

She hoped that Galbatorix would buy her lie and simply think that she was stupid. He looked at her while she was still lying on the ground, at his feet, without saying a word. She tried to get on her feet, but he slapped her again, harder. She fell once again and could actually see stars. 

“STAY DOWN,” the king yelled before kicking her in the ribs. 

The pain in her chest was terrible; she could feel her ribs crack at the impact. He was angry, she had to take it and pray that he’ll tire soon. Closing her eyes, she braced herself for the next kick. He kicked her again. It hurt like hell, she could barely breathe and she could feel tears burn behind her eyes. Another kick in her ribs made her cry. 

“I still have nine months!” Belle cried. The third kick never came. “According to our deal, I had a full year to kill him! Twelve months and it’s only been three, I still have nine months,” she explained. She was tearing up and could barely breathe, but this few seconds without a kick felt like heaven. 

She opened her eyes, hoping that he would not have the idea to kick her in the face; the slaps were painful enough already. Galbatorix grabbed her hair and pulled until she started to hiss from the pain.

“Now listen to me you foolish girl” Galbatorix began, his face so close to hers, she could fell the moisture of his breath on her skin. “I’m feeling merciful today, so I’m going to give you another chance. I’ll let you live until the end of the year, as I promised. So find Durza, find a way to win his trust and kill him. Don’t bother to come back if it’s only to talk about your failure. I won’t be so nice the next time. And don’t forget, if you failed, I won’t just kill you. I’ll destroy your whole village and kill your family in front of you.” He kicked her one last time before leaving. 

Belle tried to calm down and to breathe normally again. She still had nine months to save her village. The only question was: How?


End file.
